Time passes in funny ways. Looking backward, I don’t remember a point in time by the where the hands were lined up on the clock but rather by what clock I was using.

Most things in my life stay constant: the daily changing relationship with my mother, my close friends (I’m living with one of my best friends from nine years ago), my favorite female musicians, my reoccurring urges to write.

So I keep track of time through boys. I know the Backstreet Boys CD came out when I was in 8th grade because that was the year I had a crush on Ryan, a squirrely little skater boy obsessed with boy bands. I know I started working at the pool the summer before I entered high school because I drooled over one of the lifeguards my entire freshman year. (He threw a Sweet Tart at me during school one day. I saved it until I graduated.) I remember my junior year in college was the first year our football team went to a bowl game because that was the year I was single and Chris — a Sinatra-esque sex god — left the hotel he had already paid for in the bowl game city and drove home to see me.

I ran into Ed last week at a coffee house, outside of our usual work encounters, and a flash of memories whipped quickly through my senses. He was with a new girl and refused to make eye contact with me.

As when I see any of those boys from my past, I took a step back in time and a weird feeling crept up in me. It wasn’t jealously or regret. But I glimpsed a piece of my past walking by, and I felt overlooked because it was indifferent to the mark it left on the time line of my life.

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